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Doctor Proctor's Fart Powder
Doctor Proctor's Fart Powder
Doctor Proctor's Fart Powder
Ebook196 pages2 hours

Doctor Proctor's Fart Powder

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

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Bestselling Norwegian mystery author Jo Nesbø enters the world of children’s books with Doctor Proctor’s Fart Powder, the first book in this very funny middle-grade series. Filled with magic, wit, and bathroom humor, Doctor Proctor will keep boys and girls laughing until the end.

Eleven-year-old Nilly is new to the neighborhood, but he is quick to make friends: Doctor Proctor, an eccentric professor who invents wacky potions and powders; and brainy Lisa, who is always teased by the twin terrors Truls and Trym. All is good farty fun when Nilly and Lisa help Doctor Proctor develop his latest invention, a powder that makes you fart. The powder makes Nilly and Lisa VERY popular at school when they sell it for 50 cents a bag. (And they get revenge on Truls and Trym by giving them an extra-strength dose of fart powder that shoots them up into a tree!)

But when Doctor Proctor creates an industrial-strength version that can send people to outer space, the kids must go to great lengths to protect the invention and keep it out of the hands of their neighbors, who want to use the powder for evil purposes.

In the spirit of Roald Dahl and Lemony Snicket, Doctor Proctor offers a winning combination of humor, adventure, and absurdity that kids (of all ages) will love—proving that Jo Nesbø can keep you on the edge of the seat and make your sides split in equal measure.
LanguageEnglish
PublisherAladdin
Release dateDec 29, 2009
ISBN9781439156063
Doctor Proctor's Fart Powder
Author

Jo Nesbø

A musician, songwriter, and economist, Jo Nesbø is also one of Europe’s most acclaimed crime writers, and is the winner of the Glass Key Award, northern Europe’s most prestigious crime-fiction prize, for his first novel featuring Police Detective Harry Hole. Nesbø lives in Oslo.

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Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The first book in what is sure to be a hilarious series. The pairing of Jo Nesbo and Mike Lowery reminds me of Roald Dahl partnered with Quentin Blake, in the best way possible. I will be posting an in-depth review of this series on How I Feel About Books soon.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A very fun book with mystery, adventure (such exciting and exhilarating adventure), and all sorts of twists! This was a wonderful book to listen to and I'm positive it would be a great read with fun voices and silly effects. I'm glad to see that there are more books with Dr Proctor and his hilarity for my kids and me to explore!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is Jo Nesbo's, the hugely successful Norwegian author, first children's book and it is hilarious. A great suggestion for reluctant readers. Nilly has just moved into the neighborhood, where he meets Doctor Proctor, an inventor, and Lisa. Doctor Proctor's latest invention: fart powder that makes people fart really, really loud farts. When they tinker with the formula, they invent fartenaut powder, a powder so powerful they offer it to NASA to use as a substitute for expensive rocket ships. They begin selling the fart powder to eager kids, but the two bullies in the neighborhood insist on getting the powder for free -- so Nilly secretly substitutes the fartenaut powder and scares the willies out of the boys. Things get even crazier from there.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Originally published in Norway as Doktor Proktors prumpepulver, this amusing middle grade novel, the first in a series of adventures featuring the titular Doctor Proctor and his two young friends, draws upon the perennially popular kind of potty humor that has made titles such as The Adventures of Captain Underpants, The Story of the Little Mole Who Went in Search of Whodunit and The Gas We Pass: The Story of Farts so successful. Opening in Oslo - "the very small capital city of a very small country called Norway" - it details the coming of pint-sized Nilly to Cannon Street, where he befriends his neighbors Lisa, whose best friend has recently moved away, and Doctor Proctor, a mad-scientist type forever inventing new things. When Doctor Proctor's latest experiment produces two amazing powders, one that creates a loud but odorless fart, the other which produces a fart so powerful that it propels the person farting into the stratosphere, the three friends are pleased and excited. Nilly and Lisa see the first powder as a way to make friends at school, and to raise money - what kid wouldn't want to buy special fart powder?!? - while the Professor hopes that the second powder will allow him to win back his long-lost love, by making him a famous inventor. Things are rarely as simple as we'd like them to be, however, and the nefarious Trane family - obnoxious Hummer-driving Mr. Trane, and his two bully sons, Truls and Trym - soon interferes, going so far as to have Nilly and Doctor Proctor locked up in the city's most feared jail cell, the Dungeon of the Dead, while they set out to steal the farting powders. Can Nilly and the doctor escape in time to foil their plot? Or will Lisa, left behind on Cannon Street, be able to deal with the crisis on her own...? Chosen as our January selection over in The International Children's Book Club to which I belong, in which we read a children's book from a different country each month, Doctor Proctor's Farting Powder is the debut children's book from celebrated Norwegian crime novelist Jo Nesbø. It is an entertaining tale, with plenty of funny flatulence to keep young readers amused, and a humorous self deprecation - the constant references to Norway being such a small country, the mention of the "almost famous" annual cannon salute to the Norwegian king ("who didn't rule over enough for it to amount to anything"), the never-quite-on-time or in-tune marching bands that perform on Independence Day (Norway Constitution Day) - that will please adult readers. I can't say that it is destined to become a personal favorite, but I enjoyed the reading experience, and would consider reading the sequel, Bubble in the Bathtub.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I was never a fan of bathroom humor, and this one felt like 250 pages too much bathroom humor for me. I'm not sure how well this book worked as a point of discussion for my EL410 class: some days we could talk until our time ran out, and some days I found myself trying to force a dialogue when it would rather trail off out the window. Part of the problem is that the translation is so awkward. The combination of bathroom humor and semi-distant, semi-omnipotent narration just wasn't gelling for me.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Proving that some humor is universal, this Norwegian import is a romp worthy of all the comparisons to Roald Dahl that I've read in other reviews. Tiny Nilly moves to a new neighborhood in Oslo and discovers that his neighbor, Doctor Proctor, is a bit of a nutty professor who invents wacky, seemingly useless stuff. Like an industrial-strength fart powder that doesn't smell and can hurl a human into the atmosphere. Enter the villains, a set of twin boys named Truls and Trym and their Hummer driving father who plot to steal the powder and sell it to NASA before the good doctor can. And just because this sort of premise isn't weird enough there is a man-eating snake in the sewers and the problem of there being no gunpowder to set off the cannons on Norwegian Independence Day. Oh yeah, it'll all come together in the end. If the subject of farting as an integral part of the narrative turns you off, if it would prevent you from enjoying a funny and engaging narrative, then that's a shame. While I certainly don't condone gratuitous use of potty humor to engage young readers we have, for better or worse, lost those days where a story like this could be told about belching or something more innocent. In fact if I think too hard about this there's a quite bit of The Absent Minded Professor in this story, which makes it hardly the most original idea. But Nesbo keeps things light and, uh, airy, and fills the story with bits of the preposterous that make it genuinely funny.Like flushing poor Nilly down a toilet so he can escape a prison cell and swim (yes, swim) through raw sewage in order to escape, but becomes swallowed by the boa that lives there. And there's Nilly, watching as the snake's digestive juices dissolve the rubber on his shoes, accepting his fate and not the least bit frantic (maybe a little nervous)... until he notices something promising about some of the other contents in the snake's stomach. Without giving too much away, Nilly does indeed escape and Nesbo gives this image of a snake flying out the sewer drain and flailing around the skies above Oslo's harbor like a giant balloon quickly deflating.Nesbo has, until recently, been an award-winning writer of detective fiction in Norway and this is his first foray into children's literature. Normally I get a hinky feeling when I hear about successful adult writers tapping the children's market because sometimes it feels like the author is trading on their name, and the publishers are simply going with a known quantity over seeking out quality. That isn't the case here as Nesbo clearly knows how to entertain the audience with clever, goofy humor. And I sincerely hope that the second book, Doctor Proctor and the Time Bathtub, manages to find its way to translation soon.ALA question: Could this be a contender for the Mildred L. Batchelder award, or is it not serious enough?
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    Another book that didn't hold my attention or my 9 year olds attention. :(It appeared that it relied solely on the humor of the word "fart". Which was funny at first but half way thru we grew tired of the repeated use of the word. It became predictable and after a while we just didn't care what the characters were doing with the magical powder.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    it is a good book but it needs more description
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Doctor Proctor’s Fart Powder by Jo Nesbo (you might have seen his books for adults) is the tale of a little girl and her new neighbor (a tiny boy with a big personality). They befriend a failed scientist (suitably eccentric) with many (unsuccessful and useless) inventions to his name (all more ridiculous than the last). However, his latest invention seems to be a real winner: a powder that when ingested causes the person to fart most spectacularly and explosively. In fact, the powder is so successful that it launches the person into the sky! Can you think of anything better for a group of children? An utterly ridiculous little book this would appeal to a middle grade reader who enjoyed the Captain Underpants or Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. [A/N: This book was originally written in Swedish before being translated into English.] 5/10Trigger warning: pretty intense bullying and a corrupt, abusive father.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Typically when I see a kids' book with words such as "fart" in the title I don't give them a second glance. However, this book is written by one of my favourite thriller authors and the simple fact that he had written a children's a book was enough to make me *have* to read the book, never mind what it was called or what it was about.Surprisingly, though the book is about an invention of farting powder, there is not what I call a great deal of "toilet humour" to be found. Perhaps it's cultural, or it gets lost in translation, but the humour comes from different directions. I thought this was a delightful, funny, well-written story.Nilly is new in the neighbourhood, he is very tiny for his age. He meets neighbours Lisa on one side and Doctor Proctor on the other. Dr. Proctor lets them in on his latest invention which is a Farting Powder. When no real use for the powder can be found they decide to sell it as a novelty item to kids, but twin bullies Truls and Trym want theirs for free so Nilly gives them an extra shot in their powder which sends them flying up into a tree. Dr. Proctor has an industrial strength version of the powder which he thinks belongs safely in the hands of NASA to be used for rocketless space travel. But then someone steals the industrial strength powder for evil purposes.The story is full of excitement and adventure. Nilly finds himself in extreme situations from being sent to jail to being eaten by a boa constrictor called Anna Conda. The story also has a wonderful cultural appeal to it as well with plenty of inside jokes on Norway's size and not-so-famous status in the world. It's quite amazing that Nesbo, who writes such stunning adult thrillers, has the ability to write such a fun, whimsical children's story as well. He certainly is a talented writer. I highly recommend this. It will appeal to both boys and girls, but I'd certainly add this to any Books for Boys list. A hilarious romp. It would be great to see Nesbo come out with another children's book in the future. (Just as long as it doesn't interfere with his thrillers' schedule :-)

Book preview

Doctor Proctor's Fart Powder - Jo Nesbø

The New Neighbor

IT WAS MAY, and once the sun had shone for a while on Japan, Russia, and Sweden, it came up over Oslo—the very small capital city of a very small country called Norway. The sun got right to work shining on the yellow and fairly small palace that was home to the king, who didn’t rule over enough for it to amount to anything, and on Akershus Fortress. There it shone on the old cannons that were aimed out over the Oslo Fjord, through the window into the Commandant’s office, and onto the most remote of all the doors. The door that ultimately led to the city’s most feared jail cell, the Dungeon of the Dead, where only the most dangerous and worst criminals were kept. The cell was empty, apart from a Rattus norvegicus, a little Norwegian rat that was taking its morning bath in the toilet.

The sun rose a tiny little bit higher and shone on some children in a school marching band who had practiced waking up very early and putting on uniforms that itched, and who were now practicing marching and playing almost in time. Because soon it would be the seventeenth of May, Norwegian Independence Day, and that was the day when all the school marching bands in the whole small country would get up very early, put on uniforms that itched, and play almost in time.

And the sun climbed a tiny little bit higher and shone on the wooden wharves on the Oslo Fjord, where a ship from Shanghai, China, had just docked. The wharf planks swayed and creaked from all the busy feet running back and forth unloading goods from the ship. Some of the sun’s rays made their way between the planks and down under the wharf to a sewer pipe that stuck out into the water.

And one single ray of sunlight made its way into the darkness of the sewer pipe and made something in there gleam. Something white, wet, and very sharp. Something that bore a nasty resemblance to a row of teeth. And if you knew something about reptiles, but were otherwise very dumb, you might have thought that what you were seeing were the eighteen fangs found in the jaws of the world’s biggest and most feared constrictor. The anaconda. But nobody’s that dumb. Because anacondas live in the jungle, in rivers like the Amazon in Brazil, and not in the sewer pipes running every which way beneath the small, peaceful northerly city called Oslo. An anaconda in the sewer? Eighteen yards of constricting muscles, a jaw the size of an inflatable swim ring, and teeth like upside-down ice-cream cones? Ha, ha! Yeah, right, that would’ve been a sight!

And now the sun was starting to shine on a quiet street called Cannon Avenue. Some of the sun’s rays shone on a red house there, where the Commandant of Akershus Fortress was eating breakfast with his wife and their daughter, Lisa. And the rays shone on the yellow house on the other side of the street, where Lisa’s best friend used to live. But her best friend had just moved to a town called Sarpsborg, and seeing the yellow house empty made Lisa feel even lonelier than she had before her best friend had left. Because there wasn’t anyone for Lisa to play with on Cannon Avenue. The only other kids in the neighborhood were Truls and Trym Trane. They were the twins who lived in the big house with the three garages at the bottom of the hill, and they were two years older than Lisa. In the winter they threw rock-hard snowballs at her little red-haired head. And when she asked if they wanted to play, they pushed her down into the snow. And with icy mittens they rubbed snow into her face while christening her Greasy Lisa, Flatu-Lisa, or Commandant’s Debutante.

And now maybe you’re thinking that Lisa should’ve mentioned this to Truls and Trym’s parents so they would rein the boys in. But that’s because you don’t know Truls and Trym’s father, Mr. Trane. Mr. Trane was a fat and angry man, even fatter than Lisa’s father and way, way angrier. And at least ten times as rich. And because he was so rich, Mr. Trane didn’t think anyone had any business coming and telling him anything whatsoever, and especially not how he ought to be raising his boys! The reason Mr. Trane was so rich was that he had once stolen an invention from a poor inventor. The invention was a very hard, very mysterious, and very secret material that was used, among other things, on prison doors to make prisons absolutely escape-proof. Mr. Trane had used the money he’d made from the invention to build the big house with the three garages, and to buy a Hummer. A Hummer is a big, angry car that was made to use in wars and that took up almost the whole road when Mr. Trane drove up Cannon Avenue. Hummers are also awful polluters. But Mr. Trane didn’t care, because he liked big, angry cars. And besides, he knew that if he crashed into someone, his car was a lot bigger than theirs, so it would be too bad for them.

Luckily, it would be a while until Truls and Trym could christen Lisa with snow again, because the sun had long since melted it on Cannon Avenue, and now the sun was shining on the gardens, which were green and well groomed. All, that is, except for one. It was scraggly, drab, and unkempt, but was pleasant anyway because it had two pear trees and a small, crooked house that might possibly have been blue at one time and that was now missing a fair number of roof tiles—you could tell that much, anyway. The neighbors on Cannon Avenue rarely saw the man who lived there. Lisa had only met him a couple of times and he’d smiled and otherwise looked sort of like his yard—scraggly, drab, and unkempt.

What’s that? grumbled the Commandant as the roar of a large engine disturbed the morning quiet. Is that that darned Hummer of Mr. Trane’s?

His wife craned her neck and peered out the kitchen window. No. It looks like a moving van.

Lisa, who was generally a very well-behaved girl, got up from the table, without having finished what was on her plate or having been excused. She ran out onto the front steps. And it sure was. A moving van with the name CRAZY-QUICK written on its side was parked in front of the empty, yellow house that used to be her best friend’s house. And movers were unloading cardboard boxes from the back. Lisa went down the stairs and over to the so-called apple tree in her yard by the fence to get a closer look. The men in coveralls were carrying furniture, lamps, and big, ugly pictures. Lisa noticed one of the movers showing the other a dented trumpet that was sitting on top of one of the cardboard boxes, and then they both laughed. But she couldn’t see any sign of what she’d been hoping to see—dolls, small bicycles, a pair of short skis. And that could only mean that whoever was moving in didn’t have kids, at least no girls her age. Lisa sighed.

Just then she heard a voice.

Hi!

She looked around in surprise, but didn’t see anyone.

Hi there!

She looked up at the tree her father said was an apple tree, but that no one had ever seen any apples on. And that now appeared to be talking.

Not there, the voice said. Over here.

Lisa stretched up on her tiptoes and peered down on the other side of the fence. And there was a little boy with red hair standing there. Well, not just red, actually, but bright red. And he wasn’t just small, he was tiny. He had a tiny face with two tiny blue eyes and a tiny turned-up nose in between. The only things on his face that were big were the freckles.

I’m Nilly, he said. What do you have to say about that?

He was supposed to be named William, but the priest refused to give such a tiny boy such a long name. So Billy would have to do. But the ringer of church bells came up with a brilliant idea: a boy who was so tiny that he was nearly invisible should be called Nilly! The parents just sighed and said okay, and thus the bell ringer got his way.

Lisa asked, What do I have to say about what?

About my being called Nilly. It’s not exactly a common name.

Lisa thought about it. I don’t know, she said.

Good. The boy smiled. It rhymes with ‘silly,’ but let’s just leave it at that. Deal?

Lisa nodded.

The boy stuck his right index finger in his left ear. And what’s your name?

Lisa, she said.

Nilly’s index finger twisted back and forth as he watched her. Finally he pulled his finger out, looked at it, gave a satisfied nod, and rubbed it on his pants leg.

Jeez, I can’t think of anything interesting that rhymes with Lisa, he said. You’re lucky.

Are you moving into Anna’s house?

I don’t know who Anna is, but we’re moving into that yellow shack over there, Nilly said, pointing over his shoulder with his thumb.

Anna’s my best friend, Lisa said. She moved to Sarpsborg.

Whoa, that’s far, Nilly said. Especially since she’s your best friend.

It is? Lisa said. Anna didn’t think it was that far. She said I should just go south on the highway when I visit her.

Nilly shook his head, looking gloomy. South is right, but the question is if the highway even goes that far. Sarpsborg is actually in the Southern Hemisphere.

The Southern what-i-sphere? Lisa said, shocked.

Hemisphere, Nilly said. That means it’s on the other side of the world.

Whoa, Lisa said, taken aback. After she thought about it a minute, she said, "Dad says that it’s super warm in the south all year round, so I bet Anna can go swimming all the time

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